The Silver Screen Oasis

Christopher Plummer is also quite good in The Man Who Would Be King, one of my favorite movies, but it is probably the only time he was eclipsed as an actor, since he was appearing with Sean Connery and Michael Caine.

What a fantastic speech he gave! That's how to do it.

The Last Station was AWFUL. I remember squirming around in my seat waiting for it to be over, though he and Helen Mirren seemed to know it and were very funny in their roles. It's the kind of movie that makes you never want to set foot in Russia, especially with cinematography that gave everything a milky yellow tinge, and what looked like mosquitoes flying around all the time. yecch. It deserved a MAD magazine spoof.

As for Meryl, I like her too, not for this role exactly, though she was very good. Of course I thought Viola would win. But when Meryl got up on stage, I thought she was terribly funny about it, and quite gracious, acknowledging that it was a shock and that people all over the U.S. watching were groaning, "oh no, her again!"

I thought the show itself was one of the better AA shows, Billy Crystal seems like the grand old man now, pulling off the whole thing effortlessly. I HATED the in Memoriam, I found myself thinking, "I stayed up for this??" Once again, the writers are the most entertaining winners - as always. And I think it's funny that both Viola Davis and George Clooney looked so perfectly dressed up. They LOOKED like winners. She was all green glamour and he wearing his girlfriend, and then neither of them won.

I thought Meryl was charming in her speech, it did redeem her for me.

I've started reading The Help and I'm a third of the way through already, it's my kind of book. I'll probably rent it when it comes out, I rarely get to the pictures, it has to be a special event like The Artist to get me there these days.

Now I'm curious about Angelina Jolie and I don't even like the woman.

I didn't watch the Awards show.

One thing bugged me about the commentary about the Awards (the Awards/Nominations themselves, not the broadcast.) So many writers were complaining that this year's nominees, but "The Artist" and "Hugo" especially, were "willfully irrelevant" since they were set in the past.

"Willfully irrelevent?" If we want to talk about that, then "Gone With the Wind" was willfully irrelevant to 1939. "How Green Was My Valley" was willfully irrelevant to 1941, and (gasp!) "Schindler's List" was willfully irrelevent to 199whatever.

Aaaaah, the pundits. Who said THEY know what they're talking about. They've probably never even heard of "Gone With the Wind."